Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 32 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
7 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Siah Jamegan were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Mohammad Ali Kazemi and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Esteghlal Khuzestan asked and Al-Ittihad said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Reza Vafaei. 2‑0 against Siah Jamegan, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Ashkan Torabi could afford to be generous.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Esteghlal Khuzestan will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
7 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Esteghlal Khuzestan has to find a result from somewhere.
Boardroom5 Feb 2029
Deadline passes with 2 signed and 2 gone
That is the business done at Esteghlal Khuzestan until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Amir Ali Monjezipour reports back to Esteghlal Khuzestan with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Mohammad Ali Kazemi was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Saba have kept their man, and Esteghlal Khuzestan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Park Ju-young and Esteghlal Khuzestan agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Esteghlal Khuzestan have made the call to Al-Ittihad. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 16 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Mohammad Mehdi Ahmadi and Esteghlal Khuzestan agree another 4 years.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 25 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Mohammad Sharifi and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohammad Mehdi Ahmadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Mohammad Sharifi. 2‑0 against Padideh, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
3 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
Marked 7.92 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Esteghlal Khuzestan had the best player on the pitch.
The dugout18 Dec 2028
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Ashkan Torabi kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Aria Barzegar and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Sharifi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
There was no pressure on him and nowhere he had to be. Esteghlal Khuzestan lost a goal to a decision that took half a second and will be discussed all week.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Sajjad Danaye Baghaki trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Esteghlal Khuzestan know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esteghlal Khuzestan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Mehdi Ahmadi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Reza Vafaei has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Mohammad Sharifi has come out of that comparison in the side, and Esteghlal Khuzestan have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.97 for the rest of it.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Sharifi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Ashkan Torabi could afford to be generous.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Esteghlal Khuzestan told Abolfazl Koohi something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
25 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Esteghlal Khuzestan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Mehdi Ahmadi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Sajjad Danaye Baghaki’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Esteghlal Khuzestan needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Esteghlal Khuzestan know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody at Esteghlal Khuzestan will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Mohammad Ali Kazemi may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 36 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Esteghlal Khuzestan have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohammad Mehdi Ahmadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Aria Barzegar was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Esteghlal Khuzestan will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Sepehr Simanpour and Esteghlal Khuzestan agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohammad Sharifi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Esteghlal Khuzestan will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Esteghlal Khuzestan can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings4 Sep 2028
A brace, and Aria Barzegar takes the afternoon — 8.46
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Aria Barzegar provided it, and the 8.46 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The deal that would have taken Amir Ali Monjezipour to Rah Ahan has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Esteghlal Khuzestan with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 15 arrived, 15 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esteghlal Khuzestan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Mehdi Ahmadi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Aria Barzegar. 2‑1 against Saipa, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
0‑4 to Zob Ahan, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Esteghlal Khuzestan can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Esteghlal Khuzestan have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Amir Hossein Jalalivand was one of the reasons people came, and $610.0K does not replace that by itself.
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohammad Sharifi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Zob Ahan have kept their man, and Esteghlal Khuzestan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Esteghlal Khuzestan have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The deal with Persepolis is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Mohammad Hossein Zavari was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Mohammad Ali Kazemi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Esteghlal Khuzestan have done the hard part with Naft Tehran, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Mohammad Hossein Zavari and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Ori Levi is living that version at Esteghlal Khuzestan, and it tends to show in the first month.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Foolad have kept their man, and Esteghlal Khuzestan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“I did not go to Naft Tehran to sit and watch. I want to come back to Esteghlal Khuzestan and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Ori Levi and Esteghlal Khuzestan agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Esteghlal Khuzestan, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Nobody at Esteghlal Khuzestan will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Supporters turn on the $560.0K sale of Omid Afshin
He is going to Malavan, the club has $560.0K it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Esteghlal Khuzestan asked and Sepahan said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Esteghlal Khuzestan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Mohammad Hossein Zavari was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
28 games, 2 goals, and a squad option that has arrived without a fee attached. The interesting question at Esteghlal Khuzestan now is not whether he plays but who he displaces.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Add another name to the list: Zob Ahan have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Aram Abbasi. The answer from Esteghlal Khuzestan has not changed — yet.
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Amir Ali Monjezipour has his answer from Esteghlal Khuzestan; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Esteghlal Khuzestan, another week without a signature from Mohammad Reza Mehdizadeh.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Esteghlal Khuzestan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esteghlal Khuzestan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Amir Reza Jeddi is living that version at Esteghlal Khuzestan, and it tends to show in the first month.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Sharifi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Everybody at Esteghlal Khuzestan saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 38 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Esteghlal Khuzestan. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ahmad Savari will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Esteghlal Khuzestan the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Abolfazl Koohi and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Mohammad Ali Kazemi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
Mohammad Sharifi was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hamid Bouhamdan is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Esteghlal Khuzestan know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Mohammad Hossein Zavari has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Sajjad Danaye Baghaki may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 13 actions, 7.82, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 38 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Esteghlal Khuzestan is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Arash Akbarzadeh and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hamid Bouhamdan is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Esteghlal Khuzestan pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Esteghlal Khuzestan is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esteghlal Khuzestan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Gostaresh Foulad were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Gabriel Carvalho has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Esteghlal Ahvaz waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Esteghlal Khuzestan is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Esteghlal Khuzestan has to find a result from somewhere.
1 in and 2 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Moussa N'Diaye was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Esteghlal Khuzestan asked and Saipa said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hamid Bouhamdan is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Esteghlal Khuzestan can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Esteghlal Khuzestan can pretend not to have heard.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Esteghlal Khuzestan have done the hard part with Pakhtakor, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esteghlal Khuzestan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Add another name to the list: Foolad have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Aram Abbasi. The answer from Esteghlal Khuzestan has not changed — yet.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohammad Reza Mehdizadeh was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.74 on the card, and the Esteghlal Khuzestan support went home talking about one name.
The dugout24 Jan 2028
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Ashkan Torabi was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Esteghlal Khuzestan dressing room was either.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Gostaresh Foulad is saying, and nobody at Esteghlal Khuzestan is enjoying the guessing.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Siah Jamegan had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
17 combined actions and 7.24. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Mohammad Sharifi was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Tractor have kept their man, and Esteghlal Khuzestan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hamid Bouhamdan is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The words a physio says slowly. 22 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Esteghlal Khuzestan, and it is not being withdrawn.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Mohammad Sharifi and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The name of Mehdi Mousavi has come up in conversations Esteghlal Khuzestan were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
The words a physio says slowly. 37 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
A mark of 7.94 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esteghlal Khuzestan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
At 21 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Erfan Darvishaali. 1‑0 against Padideh, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
11 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
45 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Esteghlal Khuzestan lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Esteghlal Khuzestan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohammad Mehdi Ahmadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 38 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Esteghlal Khuzestan is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
74 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Esteghlal Khuzestan lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Esteghlal Khuzestan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Hadi Baghban trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Esteghlal Khuzestan will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
The words a physio says slowly. 35 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Esteghlal Khuzestan have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esteghlal Khuzestan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
He is 21 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Esteghlal Khuzestan, another week without a signature from Mohammad Reza Mehdizadeh.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Esteghlal Khuzestan, and 7 appearances in 10 say he has earned the hearing.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ahmad Savari will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Esteghlal Khuzestan the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esteghlal Khuzestan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout20 Sep 2027
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 1‑2 Ashkan Torabi left the room before anybody could ask which.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
32 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Foolad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
$260.0K on the table at Malavan. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
$310.0K was the most the club would pay and Malavan were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sina Asadbeigi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Foolad asked and Padideh said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Foolad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
10 arrivals, an average age nobody would call a squad, and a set of parents being shown around a building their sons will spend more time in than at home. The scouting has already happened; today is only the paperwork.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Ghasem Latifi has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Mohammad Reza Soleimani has written the date down.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Foolad, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Foolad, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Sepahan for Amin Saedi was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Squad28 Jun 2027
Words at Foolad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Reza Soleimani is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 34 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Foolad is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Padideh have kept their man, and Foolad go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Foolad have gone to Persepolis with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Hamed Lak and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Words at Foolad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Reza Soleimani is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Add another name to the list: Gostaresh Foulad have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Alireza Nazi. The answer from Foolad has not changed — yet.
At 21 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohammad Reza Soleimani was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Mohammad Ali Kazemi was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Yousef Mazrae is on it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Milad Sarlak signs something — a contract at Foolad or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Foolad. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Ramin Rezaeian and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad3 May 2027
Words at Foolad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Reza Soleimani is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Foolad told Amir Masoud Sarabadani something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Foolad will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Foolad than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Rouzbeh Cheshmi is on it.